by Alden Odessa
“Well,” I said, knowing she was right, and that this was the point of the whole game to begin with. “What do you say we get to work on that?”
4
Protection
“How did you get here?” I asked, after I finished chewing my bite of sandwich. We walked two blocks deeper into the city to grab a bite to eat. Betty said she knew of a good place that served a good sandwich at a reasonable price. She said the closer you got to The Reference the more overpriced things were, she said they were “Touristy.” I knew what that meant but she didn’t. Men who checked in and then checked out of the game.
Were more people trapped in the game? How many players were there? Was I targeted? Could some of them log in and then log out? Too many questions. Right now I just wanted to see what I could learn about the characters and NPC’s that inhabited the game itself.
“I walked,” she said with a smile and then took a bite of her sandwich.
“From where?” I asked before it dawned on me that she was being facetious, making a joke that she got to the diner by walking, with me.
Not all of her jokes worked.
“You know what I mean,” I said, humoring her with a smile and chuckle.
“Actually, I don’t. Do you mean Canny Valley?”
“Yes,” I said, “I think.”
“If you don’t know what you mean, then how am I supposed to know what you mean?” I can’t fault her logic here.
“I mean, your life. How did you, you know...”
“Become a prostitute?”
“Yeah.”
“Childhood dream,” she said, taking another bite. It took me a second to realize she was joking, this was one that worked. “It’s just something that happened, I don’t really remember how it happened.”
Interesting that she didn’t seem to remember. She either didn’t want to talk about it, or she genuinely didn’t remember, which could have something to do with her being a computer program.
It sincerely didn’t seem that she wanted to talk about it so I had to decide if I wanted to learn more of her back story or if I just wanted to move on and pursue my goals in the game.
I looked around the outside diner; it was not as big of a dump as I thought it would be, this deep into the city. I don’t know what I expected, some part of me kind of thought a dive in this game would look almost like a refuge camp. But then I remembered the game, it’s about prostitution and running a strong harem, it needed to be as glamourous as possible, but I had no idea what made one location more touristy than another. I still do not understand the mechanics of this world.
This restaurant was called Nine Dimes, and I have no idea what that means. It was no reference to the meals as the two sandwiches with a side of fries and one milkshake cost me fifteen dollars. I got the milkshake for Betty. I wasn’t kidding about fattening her up a little. This served two purposes. One was she looked emaciated and needed more fat on her bones. The other was that if I did need her to work, nobody wants a hooker that was just skin and bones.
She certainly didn’t mind, she loved the milkshake.
I would have to remember this place. It did in fact offer a good meal and a reasonable price and it was clear that it was one of the more popular places to eat as the dining area outside was packed with people. It looked like any bar and grill you would see in any urban area. It was nothing fancy, and it looked like it had been here for decades. It’s the kind of place that in the real world would have been overrun with hipsters. It even served our drinks in mason jars.
That was another fascinating detail. None of the drinks had names. The non-alcoholic ones were all based on color. I had a black soda, which as it turns out, tasted like a really really good Coke. It was sweet as all hell and savory like I had never had before. When Betty ordered, she ordered an orange. As in the server asked what kind of soda would she like and she simply said “Orange.” I tried her drink, shockingly it didn’t taste like an orange drink. It tasted more like ridiculously sweet lemonade. It basically tasted like sugar, with a bite.
Sooner or later I would get the hang of this place, but right now I didn’t have time to focus on the details since I had to focus on making an honest dollar here.
By selling women’s sex to men.
So it’s a loose interpretation of the term “honest dollar.”
“Alright, time for a plan,” I said. I’m uncertain if I was saying it to Betty or if I was saying it to myself, “tell me more about these free agents.”
Betty took the last bite of her sandwich right as I asked the question. She raised her finger to me on her right hand to let me know that she would answer as soon as she was done chewing. Like I said, she’s not high rent, but she’s not low class.
I took the opportunity to light one of my Most Popular’s. I looked at the pack, I had five left, when the hell had I had time to smoke three-quarters of a pack of smokes. I guess most of it was back at The Regency while Betty was asleep and I found my own sleep allusive.
While she was chewing, I thought it was a good time to check my stats:
H: 46 $:520 BR:44 T:55 DOM:57 PRW:70 ST:12
Not a lot had changed. The food had helped but also lowered my bank, but I knew all of that would happen as soon as I sat down. I am amazed at the detail, however. My health raised two points. Usually a meal would raise me a lot more, but the exhaustion was setting in, keeping my health low.
I realize that it’s no longer just a detail of the game to be so accurate to things like this. I had to keep reminding myself, or at least believing, that this wasn’t just a game, this was a reality. It wasn’t just a game that I slipped into from my own reality but a whole new reality unto itself. All these things, all of these stats, these were real. This was really me, this version of me. It’s like my consciousness had just transferred into this body.
This was my life now. Time to accept it. At least for the time being.
Betty finished chewing and took a drink of her orange drink. “Well,” she began, “there are a lot of girls, down around The Lower Bottoms. I can’t promise they are in good shape, since they don’t have anyone looking out for them. Most of the girls down there get pretty roughed up.”
“Meaning,” I asked, not sure if I wanted to know the answer.
“Well, the men that go down there, they’re kind of looking for something a little rougher.”
“How rough?”
“It’s not pretty,” she said with a frown.
“Have you ever been a free agent down there?”
She paused and stirred a French fry in a paper container of ketchup next to her plate. She didn’t answer right away, but I knew she had been. “It was a long time ago, a man by the name of Frank recruited me.”
“Recruited you?”
“Yeah, he—ya know, paid for stuff and then promised that he could treat me better. Make me safe.”
“Did he?”
“He made Bruce seem nice.”
This girl, the things she’d seen. It was clear, however, that it was not a fun subject for her and would prefer the topic be left alone. No reason to push, I could be here a while, I’m sure there are a lot of things from her past that will only make me feel sorry for her. I need to start thinking a little more about my needs instead of hers.
“Let’s move on,” I said, shifting the focus away from her. “These girls, are any of them taken care of?”
“You mean, have a master?”
“Master. Pimp. Whatever.”
“Yes, last I was there, there were a few harems.”
A few? This really was the name of the game. “So, you’re telling me that there are a few harems of women down there and also some free agents, and they are all there to just get beaten on by clients?”
“It’s what The Lower Bottoms are known for.”
I felt a little churning of my gut. There was an entire section of this town that existed only for shitty men to go and beat up on women, that just didn’t seem right. “So what would h
appen if we went down and there and promised protection and safety to the girls?”
“Well, I would imagine we would have the pick of the litter, but, well,” she said. I could see the hesitation on her face, “you’ve never been to The Lower Bottoms.”
“Explain,” I said.
“It’s a whole other world, the girls down there, they—” a look of sadness washes over her. “They’re in bad shape. They’re broken.”
About that time there was a commotion to my left. A man was yelling into the outside air. “I tried to help you out but you cost me more than you’re worth!”
I looked over in that direction. There was a man in a white shirt yelling at a man that was twice his size. The man yelling wasn’t exactly small, he was almost six foot with black hair and a clean-cut face, wearing a white chef’s uniform. The man he was yelling at may have actually been seven feet tall, with shoulders the size of a Volkswagen. Each arm of this man was as round as my waist, from this distance. He was a massive man, bigger than even Bruce had been, and I was terrified of Bruce (who I just remembered I owed money to).
The giant was wearing a white t-shirt and tattered blue jeans; it looked like he had cut the jeans around the waist in order to fit him and then used a thin rope to hold the jeans together where he had cut. He had also had to cut the bottom of the jeans to fit over his massive legs. The hem still only made it to about six inches above his ankle. Over all of this, he was wearing a white apron. Although he was a massive man, he walked with his head down; he was ashamed and embarrassed. He walked like a man whose dog had just died and his wife had run out on him.
He reached behind him and untied his apron, pulling it off and handing it to the man who was yelling at him. The yelling man stopped.
“Keep it you moron! I had to have it specially made! Now get the hell out of here before you break any other shit in my restaurant!”
The giant stood there, rejected as the smaller man turned and walked back into Nine Dimes. The big guy took a deep breath and turned around to walk off. I couldn’t help but think that I had never seen a man this big in my entire life. He was easily four-hundred pounds with a shaved head and stubble poking out. He was also ugly. Everything about this man screamed ogre. Where the world may see a freak, however, I saw an opportunity.
When life hands you a 12 rating in strength and you have to muscle in on a new territory, find an ogre.
5
Bogo
“What’s your name?” I asked, looking up at him. He was uglier close up. His face was a rectangle of loose skin. Deep lines ran down it, deeply embedded into it. He looked older than I suspected he was. He had light gray eyes and dark brown eyebrows. He was missing teeth. I’m not sure if that was by birth or by bar fight, but he looked like he could eat an apple through a picket fence.
Although the skin on his face sagged, his body did not. The skin on his arms was tightly drawn over the muscles. The power in his arms looked as though it would burst through his skin at any moment. His hands weren’t hands so much as they were catcher's mitts.
All of this was held up by two tree trunks he called legs. His shoes were just straps of leather tied on by a rope. Easily a solid size sixteen shoe size. I had to guess at this as I had never seen a size sixteen; it was strictly an estimate.
When he spoke his voice sounded like it was born from gravel. “Bogo.”
“Excuse me... Bogo?” I asked, assuming I had heard him wrong.
“Yes. Bogo,” he said, not even looking at me. Just continuing to keep walking.
“Like, buy one, get one free?”
He stopped. As if pondering what I had just said. “What does that mean?”
“It’s an acronym.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s really not important,” I said and then he started walking again. I was losing him. “What happened back there?”
“Bogo lost job.”
“Why?”
“Bogo break dishes, and stuff.” I was fascinated to learn what the ‘and stuff’ of that sentence pertained to, but for the moment, I needed to keep him on the line.
Betty had caught up with us when she realized that we might not be coming back. Since Bogo had kept walking in one direction, and his footsteps were two of mine, I had to walk a lot faster to keep up. I hadn’t realized we had gotten almost a block away from where we started.
“Bogo, sir. Where are you going?”
“I don’t know,” he said, for the first time using a pronoun for his name. Which was a relief, I was worried he would continue putting his own name into every sentence he spoke.
“Are you going home?”
“Bogo has no home.”
Dammit. “Do you need a job?” I asked. He stopped at this, I finally had his attention. This stopping also gave Betty a chance to get completely caught up.
“Who is this?”
I looked at Betty, he towered over her. He could pick her up and throw her without even grunting. I looked back to Bogo, “This is Betty, she’s here with me.”
“Nice to meet you ma’am,” said Bogo, cordially.
“Nice to meet you, do you need a blow job?”
Shocked, I said, “Dammit Betty, does that really need to be your go to!?”
“What?” she said, innocently.
“I mean, does that have to be your opening line?”
“I’d prefer doing that to doing anal.”
“You don’t have to do that either.”
“Isn’t that my job?” she asked.
“A blow job doesn’t sound bad,” piped in Bogo.
“I’ll get ya one,” I said to him, “I will, but not right now. She’s not on the clock, so to speak.”
“Okay,” he said kindly. “Thank you.”
I looked at Betty; she was just trying to help even though she really didn’t see the endgame here. “Betty, lets starts working on new introductions, okay.”
“Alright, should we put a pin in it?”
“Yes, good idea.” I shifted my focus back to Bogo, who was looking at Betty with hearts in his eyes. “You are very beautiful.”
Betty swooned, like she hadn’t been told that in a very long time. Maybe Never. She motioned to me to lean down to her, and she whispered in my ear, “I’ll do it for free.”
“Noted,” I whispered back. She was a cheap date, clearly. Once again, I turned my attention back to my plan, which was to hire some muscle.
“Bogo,” I said to him, he turned his attention from Betty back to me. “Do you need a job?”
“What kind of job?” he asked.
“Well,” I said. “What are you good at?”
He thought about it as a sad look came over his face. He drew in a heavy breath and then sighed. He spoke very defeated. “Breaking things I guess.”
“Perfect!” I said. It seemed to take a second to register what I had said as he had a delayed reaction. Then his frown went away, and he looked at me. I couldn’t tell what the look was that I saw in his eyes, but I think it was hope.
“Really?” he said.
“Bogo, have you ever worked in the protection business?”
“What’s that?”
“Making sure people didn’t get hurt.”
“What kind of people?” he seemed confused, I could tell I was going to need to spell this out a little better for him.
“People like,” I looked to the little lady beside me, “well, like Betty here.”
“Who would want to hurt her?”
“Exactly,” I said. The fact remained, where we were going, people did want to hurt women like Betty. I was not strong enough to run this town without a little enforcement and I sure as hell didn’t plan on shooting anybody, except myself if I’m not careful.
I had the beginnings of a plan in my head. I would go to this Lower Bottoms and one of two things were going to happen, or at least needed to happen. I needed to recruit girls to be a part of my harem and the only way that I was going to be able to recruit them w
as to offer them something better than that which they had. Right now I didn’t have any money, I couldn’t buy girls. My only hope was to sway them to working for me. So I needed to offer a better life than the one they had right now. My guess would be that none of them liked getting beat on.
Betty had said that there were other harems down there and I doubt that those “masters” would want me impeding on their territory, so I was going to need some form of protection. Bogo, fit that bill.
“Look Bogo,” I said, “I really can’t offer you much, but I would really like you to come with me and help protect Betty.” I was going to have to play on his infatuation with her. I really don’t know why he was so attracted to her, he is massive and I don’t even know how a physical relationship between the two of them would work out. He would crush the poor woman.
He looked at me for a moment. I don’t know if he was thinking it over or if he just didn’t understand what I was saying. With him it could go either way.
“Bogo will protect Betty,” he said, I couldn’t tell if he was saying that to her or to me. Either way, I was getting what I wanted, we could hammer out the details later.
“That’s great, Bogo. Where do we need to go to get your belongings?”
“Bogo doesn’t have anything.”
“Nothing?”
“No.”
“Where do you live?”
Once again a look of sadness crossed his face. He didn’t say anything, he just pointed back to Nine Dimes.
“The restaurant?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said with a sigh. “They let me stay in the alley behind.”
I was starting to realize that he may have just as sad of a story as Betty did. What was wrong with me? How was it that I was somehow able to find the two most destitute people in all of Canny Valley? Was it me? Did I somehow attract lost puppies? It could just be the programming of this place. Time will tell I guess. Or it won’t. I don’t know what to expect from one second to the next in this game.